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MANILA The Metro Rail Transit Line 3 (MRT-3), a project management office of the Department of Transportation (DOTr), on Tuesday announced full-operability of all elevators in all its 13 stations.

In a Facebook post, the MRT-3 said all 34 elevators are working, with 29 out of all its 46 escalators operational.

Sa lalong madaling panahon, up and running na po ang lahat ng 'yan (As soon as possible, all of these will be up and running), the advisory read.

Rose Anne dela Cruz, media relations officer of the MRT-3, said rehabilitation works for the rail line began when Sumitomo-MHI TESP (Sumitomo) took over as its maintenance and rehabilitation contractor on May 1, 2019.

To prevent future failures, she added Sumitomo will provide regular preventive maintenance of both types of vertical transportation systems.

Our maintenance provider will do regular preventive maintenance of the conveyance system to ensure the reliability of our escalators and elevators, dela Cruz said in a statement.

In response to a Commission on Audit report which stated declining ridership of the MRT-3 in 2018, the DOTr said the decline was due to years of neglect, bad maintenance practices, and failure to undertake scheduled overhaul and upgrading works," of its former maintenance contractor, Busan Universal Rail, Inc. (BURI).

In November 2017, BURI was terminated as a measure to prevent further degradation of the rail transit and was replaced by the MRT-3 Maintenance Transition Team.

The DOTr said aside from maintenance works, Sumitomo has been hired to facilitate a PHP18-billion comprehensive rehabilitation of the MRT-3 through an official development assistance loan from the Japanese government which has been ongoing since May and is expected to be completed by July 2021.

By then, ridership of the MRT-3 is expected to increase from the current workday average of 320,000 to 650,000 aside from increased operating speed of its trains from the current 30 kph to 60 kph and lower headway from about 8 minutes to 3.5 minutes. (PNA)

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